期刊名称：Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
印刷版ISSN：0027-8424
电子版ISSN：1091-6490
出版年度：1971
卷号：68
期号：12
页码：3092-3096
DOI：10.1073/pnas.68.12.3092
语种：English
出版社：The National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
摘要：Axonemes isolated from the sperm of the sea urchin, Tripneustes gratilla, were briefly digested with trypsin. The digested axonemes retained their typical structure of a cylinder of nine doublet-tubules surrounding a pair of single tubules. The digestion modified the axonemes so that the subsequent addition of 0.1 mM ATP caused them to disintegrate actively into individual tubules and groups. The nucleotide specificity and divalent-cation requirements of this disintegration reaction paralleled those of flagellar motility, suggesting that the underlying mechanisms were closely related. Observations by dark-field microscopy showed that the disintegration resulted from active sliding between groups of the outer doublet-tubules, together with a tendency for the partially disintegrated axoneme to coil into a helix. Our evidence supports the hypothesis that the propagated bending waves of live-sperm tails are the result of ATP-induced shearing forces between outer tubules which, when resisted by the native structure, lead to localized sliding and generate an active bending moment.
